[SMCARA] VOLUNTEER EXAMINER COORDINATOR - REMOTE TESTING

[JD Delancy]

Been studying and waiting for HamFests, club sponsored VE test sessions 
or regular in-person testing sessions to open up after the COVID-19 
restrictions gets relaxed or goes away so you can test? There’s hope!

Fully-Remote Amateur Radio License Exam Administration capability DOES 
exists. The Anchorage Amateur Radio Club Volunteer Examiner Coordinator 
(AARC VEC), the Greater Los Angeles Amateur Radio Group VEC, W5YI-VEC, 
and the Las Vegas ARRL VE Team are a few of the VEC’s offering Remote 
license testing. I’m a Volunteer Examiner (VE) with the AARC VEC.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) clarified that there is 
nothing in its rules that prohibits remote amateur radio testing, and no 
prior approval is needed to conduct remote exam sessions. The FCC 
provides flexibility to volunteer examiners and coordinators “who wish 
to develop remote testing methods or to increase remote testing programs 
already in place,” the FCC said in an April 30, 2020 news release. All 
of this stems from a request from the Anchorage ARC VEC for a very minor 
change to Part 97 back in 2014 which effectively allowed for “remote” 
testing. The Anchorage ARC VEC made the request due to the challenges of 
administering license examinations in the many remote areas of Alaska. 
Hence, they’ve been administering remote examinations since 2014, albeit 
not to the scale they are now, and all over the country and even the 
world! As a trivia note, on April 14, 1984 AARC was approved as the 
FIRST VEC Coordinator Program in the nation.

Basically, here’s what you need to know:

First, you need to have a good internet connection capable of doing 
video conferencing via Zoom or Skype. The AARC VEC uses Zoom.

You will need to have a good webcam on your computer — you may be asked 
to use a cell phone or similar as a second camera. You’ll need to be 
able to prove your test area is “clean.” If you don’t have that 
capability, theAARC VEC can use an on-site proctor so long as the 
proctor, selected by the examinee, meets the stringent qualifications 
requirements as specified by the AARC VEC. Proctors are carefully vetted 
before being approved.

The specific video conferencing software used will depend on the VE 
team, but you’ll need to be able to install it. The AARC VEC uses Zoom.

You will need a “clean” environment to take the exam in — one with 
nothing around that could be hiding cheat methods and one where nobody 
will be entering the room unexpectedly (which would probably void the 
exam). Amusingly, many people have started using a bathroom / washroom 
for this — a little weird, but who’s to judge?

If you decide you'd like to test with the AARC VEC, simply visit 
_https://kl7aa.org/vec/remote-testing/ 
<https://kl7aa.org/vec/remote-testing/>_to get started. That page 
describes Fully Remote Testing (proctorless) and Proctored testing. At 
the bottom of that page is the link to start the registration process. 
It will take you to the page that lists available exam sessions where 
you can register on the examination platform. After that, you'll be 
directed to another page to pay for your session seat and to complete 
the administrative registration. On exam day, you should expect a call 
from the Lead VE on your session to do a quick dry run to make sure any 
technical issues are resolved.

Please do not contact me as I am not involved with scheduling times and 
sourcing examiners.

     jd